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Blog PostsHold On to Your Kids: A Book for Parents
By Curtis Cooper at Nov 27, 2010 |
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At least in the first third of the book that I have read thus far, citations to underlying science for these broad claims are sparse. While Maté, a physician, did much of the writing of the book, Neufeld, a psychologist, provided most of the ideas, which derived largely from his work with patients and which were apparently refined through public speaking. As such, the book to now has offered a conceptual framework for understanding, and approaching, child development from a parent’s perspective.
As a father to three young children, I find a lot compelling in the concept of personal attachments, and the salutary effect of fostering attachment relationships between parents and children. There are natural underpinnings to this relationship. On a simpler scale than human development, Konrad Lorenz took goslings from their mother and “imprinted” himself on the young in her place, so that they followed him.
In Neufeld and Maté’s view, it is natural for humans, and especially children and adolescents, to seek or fall into attachment relationships. Further, if children and adolescents are not attached to their parents or other adults at a given time, they will tend to attach to peers. The problem with this, as Neufeld and Maté see it, is that other children and adolescents are not equipped to provide the emotional nurturing, cultural stimulation and moral guidance that are necessary for complete development. Youth whose primary attachments are to their peers are afloat at sea, without a compass to guide them or a firm rudder to steer by.
Neufeld and Maté seem right on in emphasizing the importance of family relationships and critiquing behaviorist (e.g., reward outcomes adults want and punish ones they don’t want) and pharmacological treatments which don’t address underlying causes. But they seem to be overly alarmist in portraying the fabric of American and Canadian society as tearing apart due to peer-to-peer attachments among youth filling the void of close-knit families and communities.
Was the past all that idyllic or even different? Think of child labor, the unfavored status of girls, and the much more broadly accepted use of corporal punishment of earlier times in the US and Canada. Turning to a different continent in the 19thcentury, Ivan Turgenev’s “Fathers and Sons” poignantly described the generation gap in one family, as exacerbated by the son’s semi-Nihilist friend. At least young Kirsanov and Bazarov were not constantly text messaging each other!
Moving to a more personal level, when my six-year-old daughter is slow to get out of bed in the morning after I wake her up, is it a relationship problem? When I try to entice her by offering her a piggyback ride downstairs, am I failing to address the underlying problem? Perhaps. But she likes to stay up late and sleep late. And I do play the bad guy in waking her up, not to mention that I have limited time in the morning to get ready for work. Should I worry that she likes to keep certain things private, and hide things from me? Is it something about me? I was kind of the same way… hmm…. Also, while a tight family is a wonderful thing, and parents should be a source of guidance, why shouldn’t my kids treasure their friends, and relate to them in close ways without me and my wife hovering over them?
Me too
By Small, Brian at Dec 09, 2010 03:06 AM
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Excellent post
By Leone, Michael at Nov 27, 2010 16:03 PM
Great work Curtis.
I agree that there does seem to be something natural about the various levels of attachment between parents and children, though I think it likely these are more tenuous and limited than our "co-dependency-fostering-culture" would have us realize. Many of the most "healthy" or "natural" outcomes (from my point of view obviously) come from societies or sub-groups that raise their children in more collective fashions than our isolated, and isolating, suburbian dystopias or decaying post-industrial sprawl could permit (and likely, as you point out, from a behaviorist "we need good little obedient workers" perspective.) What I'm talking about are neighborhoods and extended families, etc. These situations do not determine healthy relationships, just simply make them a bit more free and a bit more experimental, and thus, in my opinion, slightly more likely.
To me there does seem to be a danger in following psychology "down the rabbit hole" and losing track of the overwhelming institutional forces that dominate and control most aspects of our lives. Human relationships are notoriously complex and fraught with uncertainty and insecurity with absolutely nothing guaranteed. Indeed, it seems good, healthy relationships depend on luck as much as anything. However, delving into psychology seems to tell us a bit more about where not to go, rather than where to go with regard to our relationships. Like moral philosophy, most of what is known in the self-help realm is pretty much common sense, if it can be extracted from, to paraphrase, "the shit of ages."
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Re: Excellent post
By Cooper, Curtis at Nov 27, 2010 16:27 PM
A Democracy Now! interview with Gabor Maté which aired on Wednesday was what led me to Hold On to Your Kids. He touched on some worrying social conditions in US society in that segment:
"The fundamental thing that I want to get across here is that- and I made the point in my book about addiction, as well- the human brain does not develop on its own. It does not develop according to the genetic program. It depends very much on the environment. The essential condition for the physiological development of these brain circuits that regulate human behavior, that give is empathy, that give us a social sense, that give as connection with other people, that gives a connection with ourselves, that allows us to mature- the essential condition for those circuits, for those physiological development is the presence of emotionally available, consistently available, non-stressed, attuned, parenting, caregivers. Now, what do you have in a country where the average maternity leave is six weeks? These kids don’t have emotional caregivers available to them. What do you have in a country where poor women- nearly 50% of them- suffer from postpartum depression? When a woman has postpartum depression, she can’t be attuned to the child."
There seems to be a pretty strong correlation between having a strong, supportive relationship with parent(s)/caregiver(s) and growing into a healthy adult- though it's not absolute. And from what I understand, the first three years of life are an especially critical period for brain development.
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Re: Re: Excellent post
By Leone, Michael at Nov 29, 2010 21:09 PM
P.S. New old picture of me and Niki. Talk soon.
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